Sink or Zapotec (Karavinka)

[Karavinka]

Anki: 5



This is a log of my feeble attempt at Zapotec.

And this might really be a feeble attempt because I'm really not sure if I could do this.

As far as I know, there is no dedicated Zapotec-English dictionary online. Heck, even paper dictionaries seem to be largely out of print. Then hell with it, let's do without it. What can possibly go wrong? I'll be back home by Christmas, I'm just going to take a look at the paddies and check out the strange sounds coming out of the basement by myself, don't worry I'm going to be back just fine, and when this war is over...

While the Turkish project is going fine, I kind of started missing the process of decipherment. This time, being unable to look up words is simply going to be a part of the game: something like Spoiler Alert Extra. I know nothing about Zapotec, I just spent some time listening to the NT recordings on bible.com in different indigenous-minority languages and chose one that sounded good to me. The winner was Zapotec. It's going to be Isthmus Zapotec to be more specific.

As shown on the screenshot, I only need to focus on one word per card for now. While I'll try to figure out as many elements as possible, often I'll have to add sentences that I only partly understand. Maybe I'll start a more proper sentence deck later and either re-format or replace these early cards.

Instead of going back and forth and tagging different grammar notes, I'll try to annotate each sentence as I go. Doing that for the Turkish project was fun, but a lot of hassle. Let's see how this goes.

Let's start with just five cards. This alone took me like 2 hours. That's enough for today.

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Runebia'ya lii. Lii nga hombre cha'hui sti Dios.
I know thee who thou art, the Holy One of God.
Mark 1:24

lii is used for 2nd person accusative. I don't know how the personal pronouns behave in Zapotec, and I don't know what the nominative looks like. nga appears to be marking identity, and sti is one of the prepositions.

Bigani ne biree de hombre ca.
Hold thy peace, and come out of him.
Mark 1:25

bigani is probably closer to "shut up"; ne was seen enough times that I'm sure it's "and"; de and ca aren't certain. ca is an extremely common word, might even be there just for emphasis. While this is imperative, biree matches the form found in the next sentence.

Ca dxi que pe' biree Jesús Nazaret, ti guidxi sti Galilea
And it came to pass in those days, that Jesus came from Nazareth of Galilee
Mark 1:9

Other than confirming biree above, it seems ti guidxi sti Galilea is a relative clause. I know guidxi is "land", and sti is there again.

Peru qué nudii be lugar niní' ca binidxaba que pa runibiá' ca laabe.
and he suffered not the demons to speak, because they knew him.
Mark 1:34

The first half of the sentences are completely un-parsable to me; binidxaba is demon, so que pa must be "because." The difference between runebia'ya and runibiá' might be either tense or person, or both.

Ne ora bidxela ca laabe, na ca rabi ca laabe
and they found him, and say unto him
Mark 1:37

Another personal pronoun: "him." ne and na seem to be alternating, for reasons I have no idea. The -be in laabe seems to be a morpheme, maybe that's what marks the accusative.

[Karavinka]

Anki: 10

Sometimes you just can't sleep. And curse you, Turkish, I keep pronouncing /c/ in the Turkish way.


Uca dxi enda riziila'dxi para binni, cadi binni uca para laani.
The sabbath was made for man, and not man for the sabbath.
Mark 2:27

This might be the first sentence fully figured out. dxi enda riziila'dxi repeats multiple times as "Sabbath". If uca means "was made", this means Zapotec has a morphological passive?

I cannot help thinking that para must be a Spanish loanword. And binni was seen multiple times with unclear meaning, but in comparison with laani, it might be broken down to bin-ni. Laa in laani needs to be a 3sg pronoun to stand for Sabbath.

That leaves cadi as some form of negative.

Ne laca na Jesús rabi laaca'
And Jesus said unto them
Mark 2:27

This contrasts to Mark 1:37 on the previous post, where laabe was used. The if the difference between -ca/-be is number, then laa might not be a pronoun at all. Is this something like Hebrew 'immi-'immanu etc?

laa+ni : for it (3sg inanimate)
laa+be : for him (3sg -- unclear whether human or masculine only yet)
laa+ca' : for them

Ti dxi enda riziila'dxi zididi né Jesús ca discípulu sti ndaani ti ñaa.
And it came to pass, that he was going on the sabbath day through the grainfields
Mark 2:23

This ti seems to be serving multiple functions. The first is most likely a temporal preposition, the second might be relativising. Coincidentally, ti does the same thing in Thai. Ca is another very commonly seen word, here it looks like enumerating "and" or "with."

Xiñee caní' hombre ri sicarí pue.
Why doth this man thus speak?
Mark 2:7

The word sicarí appears twice in Mark 2, once here and another time "fashion." I'm assuming pue is "this", making sicarí pue "this way = thus." I'm not clear on ri, though it seems to be some kind of definiteness or deixis.

That leaves caní' as the verb: interrog. + V + S + adverbial complements.

Xii ndi pue. Xi nacubi ri canausiidi hombre ri'.
What is this? A new teaching—and with authority!
Mark 1:27

Xiñee, xii, xi seem to be the group of wh-words. And those two little ri and ri'. I have no idea what the apostrophe does.

ndi contrasts with nga. For now this might be 2nd person vs 3rd person. Hypothesis: it breaks down to n-di, and -di is the verbal ending, same as in canausii-di "it is with authority".

[Linguaphile]

It sounds as though the lack of a dictionary is an appealing part of the challenge for you, so you may not want this, but there is a good Zapoteco-Spanish dictionary here. I'm assuming you don't know Spanish (there are actually quite a few Spanish loanwords in your sentences below), so to use the dictionary you'd then have to look up the translation of the Spanish that is given. But that's do-able.
I'm going to make some comments below about the words you didn't have, but I'll put them in spoiler tags in case you don't want that info. I know very little grammar though, just some vocab (& Spanish, which helps with using the dictionary and understanding the loanwords).

Runebia'ya lii. Lii nga hombre cha'hui sti Dios.
I know thee who thou art, the Holy One of God.
Mark 1:24

lii is used for 2nd person accusative. I don't know how the personal pronouns behave in Zapotec, and I don't know what the nominative looks like. nga appears to be marking identity, and sti is one of the prepositions.

► Show Spoiler

runebia'ya = I know
lii = you
nga = used here as a copula, but also means "this, these"
hombre = man (Spanish loan: hombre)
cha'hui = benevolent
sti = of
Dios = God (Spanish loan: Dios)

Bigani ne biree de hombre ca.
Hold thy peace, and come out of him.
Mark 1:25

bigani is probably closer to "shut up"; ne was seen enough times that I'm sure it's "and"; de and ca aren't certain. ca is an extremely common word, might even be there just for emphasis. While this is imperative, biree matches the form found in the next sentence.

► Show Spoiler

Yes, bigani = "be quiet, stop talking" and ne = "and."
biree = come out, go away (this is the meaning used here); came out, left, went
de = of, out of (Spanish loan: de)
ca = this, these (before a noun it can also mean "the")

Ca dxi que pe' biree Jesús Nazaret, ti guidxi sti Galilea
And it came to pass in those days, that Jesus came from Nazareth of Galilee
Mark 1:9

Other than confirming biree above, it seems ti guidxi sti Galilea is a relative clause. I know guidxi is "land", and sti is there again.

► Show Spoiler

Yes, so it's "the land (or nation etc.) of Galilee."
ca dxi que = these days
biree = come out, go away; came out, left, went (this is the meaning used here)
sti = of

Peru qué nudii be lugar niní' ca binidxaba que pa runibiá' ca laabe.
and he suffered not the demons to speak, because they knew him.
Mark 1:34

The first half of the sentences are completely un-parsable to me; binidxaba is demon, so que pa must be "because." The difference between runebia'ya and runibiá' might be either tense or person, or both.

► Show Spoiler

I think it's a bit idiomatic, something like "but didn't give him room to speak, because the demons knew him"
peru = but (Spanish loan: pero)
qué = no, not
nudii = a form of "to give"
be = him
lugar = place (Spanish loan: lugar)
niní' = a form of "to speak"

Ne ora bidxela ca laabe, na ca rabi ca laabe
and they found him, and say unto him
Mark 1:37

Another personal pronoun: "him." ne and na seem to be alternating, for reasons I have no idea. The -be in laabe seems to be a morpheme, maybe that's what marks the accusative.

► Show Spoiler

ora = when
bidxela = found
be = third person personal suffix
laabe = him

[Karavinka]

It sounds as though the lack of a dictionary is an appealing part of the challenge for you, so you may not want this, but there is a good Zapoteco-Spanish dictionary here. I'm assuming you don't know Spanish (there are actually quite a few Spanish loanwords in your sentences below), so to use the dictionary you'd then have to look up the translation of the Spanish that is given. But that's do-able.
I'm going to make some comments below about the words you didn't have, but I'll put them in spoiler tags in case you don't want that info. I know very little grammar though, just some vocab (& Spanish, which helps with using the dictionary and understanding the loanwords).

Yes, there were a few words that I was suspecting whether they were Spanish loanwords, hombre and dios were just too obvious, para was just about there, de or peru was something I wanted to see more to be sure. And well, I don't really "speak" Spanish, but I kind of understand it to a limited extent.

But to be honest, I didn't expect anyone on UniLang to actually know any Zapotec and that's why I didn't bother with the disclaimer... Thank you for the information, you didn't spoil much. (That said, I'm not sure if I want to completely forego of the "resources" for Zapotec, because the amount of stuff in general is rather limited. I might decide to use some learner materials along with it.)

[Linguaphile]

Sometimes you just can't sleep. And curse you, Turkish, I keep pronouncing /c/ in the Turkish way.

I'm really impressed by how much you are figuring out without a dictionary or other resources.

Uca dxi enda riziila'dxi para binni, cadi binni uca para laani.
The sabbath was made for man, and not man for the sabbath.
Mark 2:27

This might be the first sentence fully figured out. dxi enda riziila'dxi repeats multiple times as "Sabbath".

► Show Spoiler

Yes. Riziila'dzi actually means "rest", dxi is "day", so it is a "day of rest."

If uca means "was made", this means Zapotec has a morphological passive?

► Show Spoiler

"Uca" is a verb meaning "it happened, it came to pass, it was".

I cannot help thinking that para must be a Spanish loanword. And binni was seen multiple times with unclear meaning, but in comparison with laani, it might be broken down to bin-ni.

► Show Spoiler

Yes, "para" is a Spanish loan. "Binni" doesn't need to be broken down, it's just an extremely common word which means "person," "individual," "being" and it's used in a lot of expressions. Here it means "man."

Laa in laani needs to be a 3sg pronoun to stand for Sabbath.

That leaves cadi as some form of negative.

► Show Spoiler

Yes, it is used for negation, "isn't," "aren't" etc.

Ne laca na Jesús rabi laaca'
And Jesus said unto them
Mark 2:27

This contrasts to Mark 1:37 on the previous post, where laabe was used. The if the difference between -ca/-be is number, then laa might not be a pronoun at all. Is this something like Hebrew 'immi-'immanu etc?

► Show Spoiler

Laa is a pronoun, or pronoun + copula ("he is, she is") and can be either gender.

laa+ni : for it (3sg inanimate)
laa+be : for him (3sg -- unclear whether human or masculine only yet)
laa+ca' : for them

Ti dxi enda riziila'dxi zididi né Jesús ca discípulu sti ndaani ti ñaa.
And it came to pass, that he was going on the sabbath day through the grainfields
Mark 2:23

This ti seems to be serving multiple functions. The first is most likely a temporal preposition, the second might be relativising. Coincidentally, ti does the same thing in Thai. Ca is another very commonly seen word, here it looks like enumerating "and" or "with."

► Show Spoiler

ti = a, in a (Spanish: un, una, en un, en una)
ca = this, these, the (Spanish: ese, eso, esa, el, la, los, las...)

Xiñee caní' hombre ri sicarí pue.
Why doth this man thus speak?
Mark 2:7

The word sicarí appears twice in Mark 2, once here and another time "fashion." I'm assuming pue is "this", making sicarí pue "this way = thus." I'm not clear on ri, though it seems to be some kind of definiteness or deixis.

That leaves caní' as the verb: interrog. + V + S + adverbial complements.

► Show Spoiler

Sicarí on it's own means "thus, like that." I think "pue" is a probably a loan from Spanish (pues) and here is used for emphasis. Caní' is a form of the verb "talk" or "speak."

But to be honest, I didn't expect anyone on UniLang to actually know any Zapotec and that's why I didn't bother with the disclaimer... Thank you for the information, you didn't spoil much. (That said, I'm not sure if I want to completely forego of the "resources" for Zapotec, because the amount of stuff in general is rather limited. I might decide to use some learner materials along with it.)

I don't know all that much. You've probably already surpassed me in terms of grammar. I've really never studied grammar at all, but memorized some phrases and vocab, plus used the dictionary quite a bit. You can find quite a few Zapotec songs on Youtube, such as "Son bigu" and "Nanga ti feo", if you are interested (many different versions of both of those, some with lyrics on screen). By the way the dictionary that I linked to has been online for decades. It may not seem especially user-friendly now (each letter of the alphabet spread out over multiple pages) but back when it was new it was really hi-tech for the time, so much so that I remember being thoroughly impressed when I found it (colors... moving graphics... clickable boxes! Wow!). The Spanish-to-Zapotec version is newer and more searchable than the Zapotec-to-Spanish version: here.

[Karavinka]

"Uca" is a verb meaning "it happened, it came to pass, it was".

You just spoiled a very important major hint (though probably unwittingly) -- the parallel I quoted was an English version as I was looking Zapotec-English, but if that's what uca means in that verse, then Zapotec is translated directly from Greek (the equivalent being ἐγένετο).

Dxi bizulú Dios bizá' guidxilayú ne ibá' maca nuu tobi ni rabi cabe Diidxa', ne uyuu Diidxa que ra nuu Dios, ne Diidxa que Dios laa.
Ἐν ἀρχῇ ἦν ὁ Λόγος, καὶ ὁ Λόγος ἦν πρὸς τὸν Θεόν, καὶ Θεὸς ἦν ὁ Λόγος.
In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.

John 1:1. The lengthy intro that seems to be paraphrasing "in the beginning" initially made me believe it might be a freer translation, but I might want to look at the Greek more often. (Alas I've forgotten too much Greek over time )

[Linguaphile]

"Uca" is a verb meaning "it happened, it came to pass, it was".

You just spoiled a very important major hint (though probably unwittingly) -- the parallel I quoted was an English version as I was looking Zapotec-English, but if that's what uca means in that verse, then Zapotec is translated directly from Greek (the equivalent being ἐγένετο).

Interesting. I would have thought it would have been translated from Spanish.There are so many different Spanish versions, though; I looked it up just now and in some Spanish translations that passage uses fue hecho (passive) but in others it uses se hizo (active).

Dxi bizulú Dios bizá' guidxilayú ne ibá' maca nuu tobi ni rabi cabe Diidxa', ne uyuu Diidxa que ra nuu Dios, ne Diidxa que Dios laa.
Ἐν ἀρχῇ ἦν ὁ Λόγος, καὶ ὁ Λόγος ἦν πρὸς τὸν Θεόν, καὶ Θεὸς ἦν ὁ Λόγος.
In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.

John 1:1. The lengthy intro that seems to be paraphrasing "in the beginning" initially made me believe it might be a freer translation, but I might want to look at the Greek more often. (Alas I've forgotten too much Greek over time )

Well... huh. That lengthy intro actually says quite a bit more (big spoiler alert). Not just a paraphrase even; it also seems to be filling in some other info from Genesis 1:1 I guess?.... I do wonder what they used as the source for the translation and how closely it matches that source version.

And now for the spoiler....

► Show Spoiler

Ἐν ἀρχῇ ἦν ὁ Λόγος
In the beginning was the Word
En el principio era el Verbo
En el principio ya era la Palabra
Dxi bizulú Dios bizá' guidxilayú ne ibá' maca nuu tobi ni rabi cabe Diidxa'

dxi = day
bizulú = began, beginning
bizá' = constructed, made
guidxilayú = world
ne = and
ibá' = sky
maca = (time expression)
nuu = exists, there is
tobi = one
ni = indicates object
rabi = say, communicate
cabe = took out
Diidxa' = Word

[vijayjohn]

But to be honest, I didn't expect anyone on UniLang to actually know any Zapotec and that's why I didn't bother with the disclaimer...

Hmm, I'm not sure I can claim to know any per se, but I do know a few Zapotec people, at least one of whom does speak Betaza Zapotec. I also nominated a song in Isthmus Zapotec (with the lyrics + a translation into Spanish) in an FSC once.

[Karavinka]

Thank you for your comments Linguaphile, but please don't feel frustrated if I don't seem to be reading what you write under the spoiler section...

Well, I kind of suspected the lengthy paraphrase is taken from the Book of Genesis, as I figured out the words for heaven and earth. I just didn't write it on my first posts as I couldn't make sense out of the rest.

And vijayjohn, I would not have been surprised if you took a look at the language at some point, it seems like you're learning anything and everything.

Anki: 20

Lii nga Xiiñe ni nadxiee ne ni rusieche naa.
Mark 1:11 Thou art my beloved Son, in thee I am well pleased.

I'm pretty sure xiiñe is "son", and and ni might be related to the sentence dealing with the second person, but I don't want to make a conclusion yet as it might as well be deixis or topicality. "naa" is some form of 1sg pronoun. And is na- a verbal prefix?

An important pair of sentences:

Iruti rucaa remiendu tindaa lari cubi lu ti lari yooxho'.
Mark 2:21 No one sews a patch of unshrunk cloth on an old garment.

Ne zaqueca iruti rigaa vinu cubi ndaani ti guidi yooxho'.
Mark 2:22 And no one pours new wine into old wineskins.

iruti: no one? or simply negative, if the verb is impersonal.
ne zaqueca: and, furthermore?
lari: cloth, garment
cubi: new
yooxho': old
lu ti / ndaani ti : onto, into
remindu tindaa: sew
rigaa: pour

And tindaa, biree, rigaa, etc. suggests vowel lengthening is a verbal ending. And lu / ndaani ti can now be assumed to be propositional.

And one little sentence from a previous post: Xii ndi pue. Xi nacubi ri canausiidi hombre ri'. Yes, na- is a prefix.

―Dananda naa. Oraqueca biasa zinanda laabe.
Mark 2:14. “Follow me,”, and Levi got up and followed him.

Noting Oraque- and its compounds as a hispanism, dananda and zinanda show an interesting pattern. Zapotec verbs can take prepositions.

Pur laabe uca irá xixé cosa
John 1:3 Through him all things were made

pur, cosa as Spanish loanwords. laabe is pronominal, and irá is "all." If xixé is related to the question word xi, it might be: "all and anything (that exists)."

Dxi bizulú guidxilayú ne ibá' maca nuu né Diidxa que Dios.
John 1:2 He was with God in the beginning.

Knowing uca, maca might be the plural equivalent, as the things that are made are guidxilayú ne ibá', earth and the heaven -- but the word position is strange. This might be something else entirely.

dxi is not only "day", but also introduces something temporal -- dxi bizulú, in principio?. That leaves nuu to mean something along the line of: with, beside, together with, but I don't feel sure about it. I get suspicious whenever I see double vowel now, this might be the verb instead.

ne Diidxa que Dios laa.
John 1:1 And the Word was God

I fail to notice an explicit verb in this. The overabundance of the hispanism que is a bit concerning, as if it's literally saying "and Word, which, God himself."

This contrasts with the above sentence where né is used instead of ne. Phonetic variant or a different word?

Ruzaani biaani que lu guelacahui, ne qué huayanda utaagu guelacahui ni.
John 1:5 The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness has not apprehended it.

I'll skip huayanda utaagu for now, that portion is hard to translate into any language.

guelacahui is darkness, and biaani is light. que lu shares an element with lu ti above, and that leaves ruzaani as the verb in this case. I'm a bit puzzled about -ni, but I'll take the vowel lengthening of ruzaa as a sign of it being a verb. (though this also happens with biaa-ni.)

Does that mean Zapotec's default word order is VSO? That'd be interesting. It feels like I just discovered some strange fetish of a blind date partner.

―Entonce tu lii pue. Ñee lii nga Elías la?
Oraque na be: ―Co', cadi Elías di naa.
John 1:19 Then who are you? Are you Elijah?
He said, I am not.

Entonce is an obvious hispanism, and the first sentence doesn't seem to have a question word. Tu and lii are still a bit confusing as to what they do, though both seem to have something to do with the second person. Please don't tell me tu is Spanish and they're equivalent.

Ñee might be a yes-no question word, or something else. Taking a look at negative:
co' sounds like the standalone word for "no", and -di and -cadi feel the positive and negative variants. "It's not (that) Elias is I."

na be is a rather common combination, I'm just noting this as a collocation.

Felipe laca binni Betsaida laa, xquidxi Andrés ne Pedru.
John 1:44 Philip, like Andrew and Peter, was from the town of Bethsaida.

I'll note laca as one of the -ca variants, and binni Betsaida sounds like "person-Bethsaida", i.e. Bethsaidaite. xquidxi would need to be "like."

Loanwords like peru, pur, ramiendu, vinu and Pedru suggests o > u in certain environments. Final syllable of a word?

[Linguaphile]

Thank you for your comments Linguaphile, but please don't feel frustrated if I don't seem to be reading what you write under the spoiler section...

That makes sense, and I understand why you might not want some of the information I posted. I'm not sure, though, if you want any help or comments (and if so, what type?) I'm not really sure how much to post (if anything).

Below I'm going to comment on a few of your translations. Where I think your translation is heading down the wrong path, I'll tell you which part, but I won't correct it. In other words I'll tell you what the word doesn't mean but I won't tell you what it means. (Although I can in a later post if you want me to.)

Iruti rucaa remiendu tindaa lari cubi lu ti lari yooxho'.
Mark 2:21 No one sews a patch of unshrunk cloth on an old garment.

► Show Spoiler

remindu tindaa: sew

Tindaa doesn't mean what you seem to think it means. (Hint: tindaa is not part of the verb.)

Dxi bizulú guidxilayú ne ibá' maca nuu né Diidxa que Dios.
John 1:2 He was with God in the beginning.

► Show Spoiler

Knowing uca, maca might be the plural equivalent, as the things that are made are guidxilayú ne ibá', earth and the heaven -- but the word position is strange. This might be something else entirely.

Yes, exactly: it is something else entirely.

ne Diidxa que Dios laa.
John 1:1 And the Word was God
I fail to notice an explicit verb in this.

► Show Spoiler

Do you want me to explain about the verb you don't find?

The overabundance of the hispanism que is a bit concerning, as if it's literally saying "and Word, which, God himself."

► Show Spoiler

As for the "overabundance of the hispanism que", this word has more than one meaning.

Loanwords like peru, pur, ramiendu, vinu and Pedru suggests o > u in certain environments.

► Show Spoiler

Yeah. That's really common with Spanish loanwords in many languages of Central and South America. From what I understand, historically in Zapotec o/u were original a single vowel (something between the two) and in some varieties of modern Zapotec (but not Isthmus/Juchitán) u is only used in loanwords.

[Karavinka]

Damn you sleep disorder.

Below I'm going to comment on a few of your translations. Where I think your translation is heading down the wrong path, I'll tell you which part, but I won't correct it. In other words I'll tell you what the word doesn't mean but I won't tell you what it means. (Although I can in a later post if you want me to.)

The English is usually just NIV, one of the many English translations and I expect the senses to correspond only roughly, not exactly. Sometimes I take a peek at Greek or other translations, but not always. My initial interpretations will be pretty wrong, it's something I expect to happen a lot.

Anki: 31

Dxi naca Herodes rey de Judea nuu ti sacerdote lá Zacarías, nuu be lade grupu sti Abías.
Luke 1:5 In the time of Herod king of Judea there was a priest named Zechariah, who belonged to the priestly division of Abijah

Looks like dxi naca Herodes rey de Judea is a temporal clause, and nuu needs to be the predicate. And Herodes rey de Judea -- almost sounds like the Gospel is codeswitching. I imagine more extensive codeswitching
would not be uncommon among the Zapotecs.

―Ximodo ganna dxandí zaca ni caya'bu naa ri ya', purti ma nayooxhua' ne xheela laca ma nayooxho'.
Luke 1:18 “How can I be sure of this? I am an old man and my wife is well along in years.”

Other than this strange adaptation of quomodo, I cannot parse the first part, but

nayooxhua' > nayooxho + ya?
nayooxho'

yooxho' was already identified in the previous post, and xheela as wife can be found elsewhere on the chapter. Since purti most likely is a conjunction, that leaves ma to stand for "I am" and "she is."

As for the na-forms, my first tentative guess is: stative.

―Naa nga Gabriel
Luke 1:19 I am Gabriel

The difference of nga, ndi series., and ma could be what follows after it.

―Ximodo zanda gaca ndi ya', purti binni dxaapa naa.
Luke 1:34 How will this be, since I do not know man

dxaapa is virgin, so purti binni dxaapa naa is "I am person-virgin"; for the first half, other than ndi it's a bit murky.

Peru na jñaa be co', iree lá be Juan.
Luke 1:62 but his mother spoke up and said, “No! He is to be called John.” (Ἰωάννης ⸀ἐστὶν ὄνομα αὐτοῦ)

jñaa is mother. I think I'm getting a sense of the word be: it introduces a quote.

Nga runi lagaca nacha'hui ne irá binni, cásica nacha'hui Bixhoze tu ni nuu ibá'.
Matt 5:48 Be perfect, therefore, as your heavenly Father is perfect.

nacha'hui is perfect, cásica would be as, another mix of hispanism. runi and lagaca occur multiple times in the chapter, serving as conjunction of some kind.

nacha'hui is the na-form of cha'hui found in: Runebia'ya lii. Lii nga hombre cha'hui sti Dios.
It's unclear whether nga or lagaca is the imperative "be y'all!"

Bixhoze du ni nuu ibá'
Matt 6:9 Our Father in heaven,

For now, let's take tu as 2pl and du as 1pl.

Lainaba lu Dios, zudii laatu. Lauyubi, zadxela tu.
Matt 7:7 Ask and it will be given to you; seek and you will find

pa ninaba xiiñi laa ti gueta, nudii ti guie.
Matt 7:9 if your son asks for bread, will give him a stone?
if ask son pron. for bread, give for stone?

Purti tutiica inaba zacaa, ne ni uyubi zadxela
Matt 7:8 For everyone who asks receives; the one who seeks finds

ne huaxié' tu ridxela ni.
Matt 7:14 and only a few find it

Ne ora bidxela ca laabe, na ca rabi ca laabe
And this from the first post, Mark 1:37.

la-inaba vs n(i)-inaba
zu-dii vs nu-dii
za-zdxela vs ri-dxela vs bi-dxela

It seems like this will be the big part of cracking the Zapotec code. But zadxela tu vs zadxela pair tells me what the prefixes aren't: person, at least not entirely.

da- as in dananda naa might be contrasting with la- as in la-inaba as in imperative singular or plural, but outside imperative I am yet to find a clear example of where the prefix potentially corresponding with the person.

[Karavinka]

Anki: 38

I think I like this format. The thread is going to get long, but it's easier to re-trace what I was thinking a week ago.

―Xi napa nia lii, Jesús Xiiñi Dios ni nandxó'.
What do you want with me, Jesus, Son of the Most High God? (Mark 5:7)

Knowing xi is the base question word, I am inclined to think of nia as a preposition.

Ne unaba diidxa Jesús laabe tu lá be. Para na be: ―La'ya Legión purti stale du.
Then Jesus asked him, “What is your name?”
“My name is Legion,” he replied, “for we are many.” (Mark 5:9)

diidxa is word, so if unaba is the verb, it'd form a collocation to mean "ask." (This will repeat again) Tu and du as "you (pl)" and "we" confirm a previous comment, and lá would need to be "be called, llamar."

Compare:
Runebia'ya lii. Lii nga hombre cha'hui sti Dios.

It'd be interesting if -ya marks both 1sg and 1pl. But god I hope it's not reflexive.

Cadi idxibi lu', bini cre si naa.
Don’t be afraid; just believe. (Mark 5:36)

So, cadi can be used for negative imperative and cre is a Spanish loanword. I'm starting to think lu might be either pragmatic or aspectual, and it's terrifying to think either way.

―Ma guti xiiñi lu', xi para cuchiiña rou' maistru.
Your daughter is dead,” they said. “Why bother the teacher anymore? Mark 5:35

―Ma cayati xiiñe'. Chuu, quixhe ná lu luguiá be ti guianda be ne cadi gati be.
My little daughter is dying. Please come and put your hands on her so that she will be healed and live. Mark 5:23

xiiñi and xiiñe' show an important distinction: your and my.

Ma is a part of a collocation "ma bibani" in Mark 6 as well, when John the Baptist supposedly rose from "the dead." The ma in ma guti and ma cayati would be related.

purti ma nayooxhua' ne xheela laca ma nayooxho'.
I am an old man and my wife is well along in years.”

And "ma" then doesn't need to stand for "I am" or "she is", this might be another collocation.

But more importantly: "Is dead" and "is dying" is apparently marked by the presence or absence of lu. I'm thinking that the core verbal system must be built on the prefixes, so I'll go with the assertive for lu.

Peru xcaadxi na: ―Elías nga.
Others said, “He is Elijah.” (Mark 6:15)

I've noticed x- prefix a few other times, don't know what it serves. Elías nga shows pro-drop.

Unaba naa intiica acala'dxu ne zudiee ni lii.
Whatever you ask I will give you, up to half my kingdom. (Mark 6:23)

On the last post I assumed the base for "ask" was -inaba, but it might be naba instead.

pa ninaba xiiñi laa ti gueta, nudii ti guie.
Matt 7:9 if your son asks for bread, will give him a stone?
Lainaba lu Dios, zudii laatu. Lauyubi, zadxela tu.
Matt 7:7 Ask and it will be given to you; seek and you will find

Let's take a look at these. Superficially, it looks like it can be broken down to:

zu-di-ee
zu-di-i
nu-di-i

zu- and nu- cannot be persons, as zudiee and zudii are clearly different persons in the sentences. Let this be the first theory:

zu-: declarative, certainty in the future
nu-: rhetorical questions, hypothetical future, subjunctive

Note to self: look for more instances of unaba. Out of the two instances on this post, one was translated into simple past tense, the other into something like subjunctive present.